KC Royals One Year Ago: 5-4 Win Over Houston In ALDS Game 2

Putting Away The Game

Kelvin Herrera held the Astros scoreless in the seventh before Alcides Escobar greeted Astros reliever Will Harris with deep fly that dropped between the outfielders in right-center. Center fielder Jeff Marisnik allowed the ball to bounce off the heel of his glove. That blunder let Escobar take third standing up.

Ben Zobrist then slapped a liner through the gap between short and third with the Astros playing a shift. The single drove in Escobar to put KC up 5-4.

Releivers Ryan Madson and Wade Davis finished out the game with two scoreless innings for the win.

Today’s Perspective

One eye opener watching it today is how good the Royals were at making contact with two strikes. In key situations, they were much better at forcing the other team’s defense to make a play. It was also startling to see the routine competence of the bullpen after suffering through Soria’s meltdowns in September.

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You can watch the whole of game 2 here, if you’d rather relive a Royals playoff victory than watch other teams play tonight. Overall, the 2015 KC Royals really don’t look all that different on the field than the 2016 team. They play a lot like the 2016 team did in August.